Indian banks had $537m exposure in Dubai World

New Delhi, April 26, 2010

As many as seven Indian banks had an exposure of around $537 million in Dubai World and other group companies at the time of the emirate’s debt crisis in November 2009, an Indian minister has said.

The list of banks include both public sector and private sector banks such as SBI, Bank of Baroda and ICICI Bank, minister of state for finance Namo Narain Meena told the Lok Sabha.

But there is little cause of concern and the recent global financial crisis has proved the soundness and resilience of the Indian banking system, he was quoted as saying in a report in The Economic Times.

“Indian public sector banks are adequately capitalised and they are maintaining higher capital-to-risk weighted assets ratio (CRAR) to meet any additional provisioning requirement arising out of any unforeseen higher NPAs,” he said.

While the country’s largest lender State Bank of India had exposure to the tune of $50 million, Bank of Baroda had an exposure of $200 million. Among the private sector banks, ICICI Bank had an exposure of over $28 million and HDFC Bank of $4.23 million.